City to convert lane of downtown street to bike path

This fall, Houston could see its first protected
on-street bicycle lane, in which a full traffic lane of westbound Lamar, pictured, would be closed for bicyclists.

Photo: Brett Coomer, Staff

Houston may get its first protected on-street bike route as early as October, as city officials prepare to convert a lane of Lamar Street downtown into a two-way cycling path connecting the popular Buffalo Bayou trails west of downtown to Discovery Green and points east.

The nearly three-quarter-mile connector, from the east end of Sam Houston Park to the edge of Discovery Green, will be painted green and separated from the remaining three lanes of traffic by a two-foot barrier lined with striped plastic humps known as "armadillos" or "zebras," said Laura Spanjian, the city's sustainability director.

Signals will be added at intersections to direct cyclists headed east on one-way westbound Lamar. Officials hope to begin work in September and open the lane in October.

Michael Payne, executive director of Bike Houston, said the 11-block dedicated lane will be a crucial link to safely get cyclists from the Buffalo Bayou trails to the well-used Columbia Tap Trail east of downtown that runs past Texas Southern University. A link from that trailhead to the George R. Brown Convention Center is under construction.

"The key here is that physical separation, which makes cyclists feel more comfortable, that their space is defined," Payne said. "When you're on a bike route you're right out there with the traffic. The whole objective here for Houston is to develop infrastructure that makes people feel comfortable, safe and encourages them to get out of their houses and out of their cars and use their bicycles both for recreation and for transportation."

Karel Chaloupka, a Washington Avenue corridor resident who rides for exercise, said that when crossing downtown to the Columbia Tap he takes routes he acknowledges are not safe or rides on the sidewalks and gets chewed out by police.

"They do need something get across town, instead of riding on the streets. Riding on the roads is dangerous," he said. "There's no way to get over there."

Lloyd Siberdt, who also lives along Washington Avenue, commutes by bike at least three days a week to his work at Main and Walker. He said he likely will use the Lamar lane.

"If it's protected enough I would, because it's annoying to ride on sidewalks," he said. "You have to stop all the time, you disturb the pedestrians. But it has to be protected."

Payne said the idea of a protected lane is an advance for Houston, which lags other big cities in cycling infrastructure and too often relies simply on "share the road" signs.

Michael Skelly, a businessman and Bike Houston board member who helped gather business support for the Lamar route, agreed.

"Most major cities in the U.S. have learned that this sort of transportation infrastructure is very much appreciated by folks," Skelly said, "and then, once you build it, they show up."

Jeff Weatherford, who directs traffic operations for the city's Department of Public Works and Engineering, said Lamar was chosen in part because the lane being converted is devoted to parking except during rush hours.

The other available streets that had a parking lane to give were Walker, McKinney and Dallas, but Weatherford said Walker and McKinney see higher speeds and more traffic movement because they become Interstate 45 on-ramps. And long Dallas, downtown boosters plan retail-oriented improvements. Lamar is the default choice, he said.

Fewer cars daily

Average traffic counts show Lamar also carries fewer cars daily than the other three streets considered. At its busiest, between 4 and 5 p.m., Lamar averages 1,240 vehicles between Allen Parkway and Travis. East of Travis, the counts drop sharply; the blocks of Lamar closest to the convention center, at their busiest, see fewer than 200 cars per hour.

Joe Dilg, a lawyer at Vinson and Elkins, whose tower borders Lamar and who helped contact tenants along the route, called the path an obvious idea that will be crucial to attracting talent to Houston and make it "a better world-class city."

"I think everybody sees the benefit for their own employees and for attracting people to the downtown area," he said. "I don't see the bike path as being any more difficult to deal with than vehicle traffic, and the lane they're talking about is mostly surface parking for relatively few cars, anyway."

Dilg and several others involved in contacting businesses along Lamar said they have heard only positive feedback, but acknowledged not every tenant has responded.

Bob Eury, of the Downtown Management District, said the parking garage entrances and exits on Lamar are not ideal, but added that a bike lane is not much different than a vehicle lane for merging purposes.

Spanjian said future targets for dedicated on-street bike lanes will be identified as part of a master plan that she said will ramp up this fall. For now, she said, the need for the Lamar route was too obvious to wait for the study.

"This park connector was a perfect example of a really significant connection that was missing between two very popular and well-traveled off-street bike trails," she said. "Needing a safe connection for bicyclists downtown was something that was seen as very important."

Mike Morris has covered City Hall for the Chronicle since early 2013, having covered Harris County government for two years prior to that. Before coming to Houston, he covered local government, agriculture, business and sports at daily and weekly newspapers in southern Indiana and central Ohio. He covers all things policy and politics in the nation's fourth-largest city, explaining the roots of today’s complex problems and exposing public corruption and failing programs. In 2012, he won the Texas Associated Press Managing Editors’ annual Freedom of Information award and was a Livingston Award finalist for a series of stories documenting rampant mismanagement at the Harris County Housing Authority.